I was going to prepare a Flames primer to free agency, but decided not to re-invent the wheel when I saw Haley had already done an admiral job of things. Make sure to visit M&G for a thorugh overview.

I have to say, this is perhaps the murkiest July 1 for the Flames I've seen since the lock-out. Previously, whether facing many or few obstacles, the obstacles were at least apparently obvious.

Not so this year. The Flames cap room is not only tenuous but also completely muddied by Dawes (buy-out?)

Kotalik (uh...waived for an as-of-right-now unclear purpose) and pending $3M+ contract of Ian White (maybe?). The lackluster free agent pool makes things even less certain - we know the Flames want "offense", but there's no clear method to acquire the requisite players. Big trade on it's way? Almost every Flame worth anything on the trade market has a NTC. And the club doesn't have much in the way of prospects or draft picks to dangle either.

As such, we enter things almost completely blind. There's a chance the coming week will end without any significant changes whatsoever. And probably an equal chance the face of the team may have been altered irrevocably. We can only sit back and watch as things unfold. And hope.

Anyways, Pat, Bob, Myself and Ross Creek will endeavor to keep up with on-the-spot updates and analysis as things come down tomorrow. Feel free to share you comments, questions, fears, hopes, dreams and reactions in the comments.

Lot of money for Maholtra in VCR, although he’s decent.
Ellis didn’t last long in Montreal.
Amazing Lydman is still moving around for relatively large dollars this many years after leaving Flames.
I like Colby Armstrong, but as always the Leafs overpaid.

So they are reporting the Canucks are tops on the list for Hamhuis. Lets assume they pay close to 5 mill. How on earth can they afford all of this? They still have players to resign, added ballard and Malhotra. Add in the high salaries of the Sedins and Luongo. Surely this must bite them. Hamhuis, Ballard and malhotra arent going to take them to the cup.

Good god...TSN is lending credence to the Jokinen deal. 2 or 3 years for $3M per!!

I will f'ing lose it if that happens.

Heh, is it bad that the second I saw that rumor online I immediately clicked here to see if Kent's head had actually exploded? Seriously, Olli... go back to Florida the SE was kind to you, the NW... not so much.

OMG the owners need to get on the phone RIGHT NOW and can his A$$. What a F*#@ing farce this is becoming. I was starting to feel kinda good about Sutter. He got Tanguay, was lookin to trade for Savard. The potential was there. He needs to be fired right now though.

Ok, I know this all sounds insane and I would love the money to be spent elsewhere but I do think this:

IF, Joker came back, surely they would have some guarantee that Kotalik was off the books, yes? Like gone for good to Russia, without earning a dollar more kinda gone.

THEN, I would rather have Joker at 3million per, than I would Kotalik at 3 million per.

In fact, I think Jokinen would be a good signing if we could get him for 2 million per. 3 not so much....5 like before was terrible.

but then again, I was a defender of Joker's 35pts and 12 posts in 56 games.

But again, I would prefer it not to happen again.

IF Jokinen is re-signed you can't defence the trade for Kotalik in any way unless they resign Higgins. The only thing that makes sense is that Darryl wanted Higgins and had to take Kotalik. How bad do you want Higgins though?

IF Jokinen is re-signed you can't defence the trade for Kotalik in any way unless they resign Higgins. The only thing that makes sense is that Darryl wanted Higgins and had to take Kotalik. How bad do you want Higgins though?

I mean seriously.

Oh, I'm not defending that trade. I'm one of the only ones in this forum (or others) who didn't want Joker traded for fear we would get something back like what we got back.

Listen.

The Jokinen trade resulted poorly to bring him here.

Jokinen for 5 million/yr is terrible value

The Jokinen trade to ship him out was an unmitigated disaster.

That doesn't mean Jokinen isn't an NHL player.

It also doesn't mean that if we could scoop him for ~2million, it wouldn't be worth it.

But if we could get both Tanguay and Joker for sub 4-4.5 million. I would take that. If that's Daz's strategy, then the money makes sense IMHO.